2nd. To Westminster by water with Sir W. Batten and Sir W. Pen, (our servants in another boat) to the Admiralty; and from thence I went to my Lord's to fetch him thither, where we stayed in the morning about ordering of money for the victuallers, and advising how to get a sum of money to carry on the business of the Navy. From thence W. Hewer and I to the office of Privy Seale, where I stayed all the afternoon, and received about 40l. for yesterday and to-day, at which my heart rejoiced for God's blessing to me, to give me this advantage by chance, there being of this 40l. about 10l. due to me for this day's work. So great is the present profit of this office, above what it was in the King's time; there being the last month about 300 bills, whereas in the late King's time it was much to have 40. I went and cast up the expense that I laid out upon my former house, (because there are so many that are desirous of it, and I am, in my mind, loth to let it go out of my hands, for fear of a turn.) I find my layings-out to come to about 20l. which with my fine will come to about 22l. to him that shall hire my house of me.
4th. To White Hall, where I found my Lord gone with the King by water to dine at the Tower with Sir J. Robinson, Lieutenant. [Sir John Robinson, created a Baronet for his services to Charles II., 1660, and had an augmentation to his arms. He was Lord Mayor of London, 1663.] I found my Lady Jemimah [Lady Jemimah Montagu.] at my Lord's, with whom I staid and dined, all alone; after dinner to the Privy Seale Office, where I did business. So to a Committee of Parliament, (Sir Hen. Finch, [Solicitor- General, 1660; Lord Keeper, 1673; Chancellor, 1675; created Earl of Nottingham, 1681. Ob. 1682,] Chairman), to give them an answer to an order of theirs, "that we could not give them any account of the Accounts of the Navy in the years 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, as they desire."
6th. This night Mr. Man offered me 1000l. for my office of Clerke of the Acts, which made my mouth water; but yet I dare not take it till I speak with my Lord to have his consent.
7th. Mr. Moore and myself dined at my Lord's with Mr. Shepley. While I was at dinner in come Sam. Hartlibb and his brother-in- law, now knighted by the King, to request my promise of a ship for them to Holland, which I had promised to get for them. After dinner to the Privy Seale all the afternoon. At night, meeting Sam. Hartlibb, he took me by coach to Kensington, to my Lord of Holland's; I staid in the coach while he went in about his business. [Samuel Hartlib, son of a Polish merchant, and author of several ingenious Works on Agriculture, for which he had a pension from Cromwell.—VIDE CHALMERS'S BIOG. DICT.]
9th. With Judge Advocate Fowler, Mr. Creed, and Mr. Shepley to the Rhenish Wine-house, and Captain Hayward of the Plymouth, who is now ordered to carry my Lord Winchelsea, Embassador to Constantinople. We were very merry, and Judge Advocate did give Captain Hayward his Oath of Allegiance and Supremacy.
10th. With Mr. Moore and Creed to Hide-parke by coach, and saw a fine foot-race three times round the Park, between an Irishman and Crow, that was once my Lord Claypoole's footman. [John Lord Claypoole married, in 1645, Mary, second daughter of Oliver Cromwell, to whom he became Master of the Horse, and a Lord of the Bedchamber; he was also placed in his Father-in-Law's Upper House. During Richard Cromwell's time he retained all his places at Court; and at the Restoration, never having made an enemy whilst his relations were in power, he was not molested, and lived till 1688. His father had been proceeded against in the Star Chamber, for resisting the payment of Ship Money, and was by Cromwell constituted Clerk of the Hanaper, and created a Baronet.] By the way I cannot forget that my Lord Claypoole did the other day make enquiry of Mrs. Hunt, concerning my house in Axe yard, and did set her on work to get it of me for him, which methinks is a very great change. But blessed be God for my good chance of the Privy Seale, where I get every day I believe about 3l. This place my Lord did give me by chance, neither he nor I thinking it to be of the worth that he and I find it to be.
12th (Lord's day). To my Lord, and with him to White Hall Chapel, where Mr. Calamy preached, and made a good sermon upon these words "To whom much is given, of him much is required." He was very officious with his three reverences to the King, as others do. After sermon a brave anthem of Captain Cooke's, [Henry Cooke, Master of the Children of the Chapel Royal, and an excellent musician. Ob. 1672.] which he himself sung, and the King was well pleased with it. My Lord dined at my Lord Chamberlin's. [The Earl of Manchester.]
14th. To the Privy Seale, and thence to my Lord's, where Mr. Pin the taylor, and I agreed upon making me a velvet coat. From thence to the Privy Seale again, where Sir Samuel Morland come with a Baronet's grant to pass, which the King had given him to make money of. Here we staid with him a great while; and he told me the whole manner of his serving the King in the time of the Protector; and how Thurloe's bad usage made him to do it; how he discovered Sir R. Willis, and how he had sunk his fortune for the King; and that now the King had given him a pension of 500l. per annum out of the Post Office for life, and the benefit of two Baronets; all which do make me begin to think that he is not so much a fool as I took him to be. I did make even with Mr. Fairebrother for my degree of Master of Arts, which cost me about 9l. 16s.
15th. To the office, and after dinner by water to White Hall, where I found the King gone this morning by five of the clock to see a Dutch pleasure-boat below bridge, where he dines and my Lord with him, The King do tire all his people that are about him with early rising since he come.
18th. Captain Ferrers took me and Creed to the Cockpitt play, the first that I have had time to see since my coming from sea, "The Loyall Subject," [A Tragi-comedy by Beaumont and Fletcher.] where one Kinaston, a boy, acted the Duke's sister, but made the loveliest lady that ever I saw in my life. [Edward Kynaston, engaged by Sir W. Davenant in 1660, to perform the principal female characters: he afterwards assumed the male ones in the first parts of tragedy, and continued on the stage till the end of King William's reign, The period of his death is not known.]